Lost
by starofhades
Summary: Misao is a runaway at the end of her rope.


_**LOST**_

_**Chapter One: Blackberry Daiquiri  
  
DISCLAIMER: I'm not sure where the heck the inspiration for this story is coming from -- angst is not usually my thing -- but let me reassure you I'm not Nobuhiro Watsuki and this is definitely fanfic.  
  
**_  
_Aoshi._  
  
I sighed and sipped the dregs of my blackberry daiquiri, a drink that I didn't have the money to pay for. It was sweet and grainy and mostly melted, and I needed the false warmth of the rum to steady me against the certainty that I was completely and totally screwed. I had no place to go tonight, and I'd been unable to entice any of the men here to take me home with them.  
  
Three years ago, when I'd fled Aoshi and the only home I'd ever known, I had no idea where I was going or what life might hold for me. Sure, I was young, and I'd never lived on my own before, but I was strong, I told myself. Resourceful. How hard could it be? I'd grown up helping out in my adopted grandfather's restaurant, the Aoiya, and I knew how to cook almost anything.  
  
But I soon found that no one would hire me as a chef because I didn't have any references: I couldn't give them my grandfather's phone number, because then he'd know where I was. And I'd never worked anywhere else.  
  
My first job was bussing tables at an Italian restaurant that sold $20 plates of overdone pasta by candlelight. The head waiter, Rico, was a shrimpy little guy with greasy hands and a permanent leer. By the end of my first shift I'd realized that he'd hired me because he liked my looks. By the end of my third week, it was clear that nothing I could say was going to persuade Rico to stop fondling my ass every time I walked by. So I slugged him.  
  
After that I'd been a dishwasher, a janitor, an errand girl, a telemarketer, a manicurist, and for two and a half hours, a temp. (It's not my fault that the regular secretary didn't back up her data before she went on maternity leave.)  
  
I'd shared a filthy room with two other women in an apartment building that should have been condemned years ago. It was bearable because somewhere, in the depths of my soul, I was certain that it wasn't real. That I would wake one morning and Aoshi would be there. That he loved me -- not with the kind of love you feel for a little sister whose idolizes you, but with the single-minded, devouring kind of love that only an infatuated 17-year-old girl naively demands from the object of her obsession.  
  
_Suck it up, Misao,_ I told myself in the firmest mental tone I could muster, ignoring the aching emptiness of my stomach. I hadn't had anything to eat since yesterday morning, and the blackberry-tainted sugar rush just made me more aware of how hungry I was.  
  
After I'd lost the temp job, my roommates had kicked me out -- nothing personal, but I couldn't make my share, and they preferred to find a replacement rather than be evicted because of me. One of the girls, Lucrezia, had offered to let me store my few remaining possessions under her bed, and sometimes, when one of the other girls was out, Luc might sneak me in for an afternoon nap.  
  
I'd been unemployed for months now, living off the charity of acquaintances, always somehow managing to find a place to crash. When all else failed, I fell back on my secret weapons -- I'd wiggle into the little black lycra dress I'd bought at the Salvation Army store, kohl my eyes and rouge my cheeks until I resembled a silent film starlet, and slide into a pair of purple lame pumps with four-inch heels, which I'd scored when one of Lucrezia's other roomies had been arrested for dealing pot a couple of blocks away from the downtown police station. Then, all dolled up, I'd hang out at a bar like this one and pick up some desperate, drunken man, feigning interest in him long enough to be taken home. It seemed like a fair deal: they got what they wanted -- sex -- and I got what I wanted, which was a bed to sleep in (and if I was really lucky, breakfast). But lately, even that was becoming harder and harder to manage. I was losing my touch.  
  
My touch? Who was I kidding. I was losing my mind.  
  
The bartender roused me from my thoughts with a shout of "Last call!" He looked meaningfully in my direction -- I'd been nursing this daiquiri for more than two hours. _Shit._ I slipped off of my sticky bar stool, glanced towards the restrooms at the back of the bar. _Wonder if there's a window in there big enough for me to crawl out through?_ "Be right back," I mumbled, in case the bartender was paying attention.  
  
The bar was nearly empty. There was a couple leaning against each other, swaying heavily over the small section of scratched wooden floor in front the jukebox (apparently, they were too wasted to notice that the jukebox wasn't playing any music). An old guy at the table near the door, snoring face down amidst a half-circle of empty beer mugs.  
  
I ran my fingers through my hair, a new nervous habit. Ever since I was very small, I'd worn my hair in a long, thick braid that fell down to the backs of my knees, but when I ran away, I'd hacked it all off so that it barely reached my shoulders. I still wasn't used it -- walking around with my hair so short was like being a little bit naked all the time.  
  
Resisting the urge to bolt for the door, I forced myself to walk slowly toward the restrooms. There was one other customer in the bar. He was sitting toward the back of the room, a tall lean man with his chair tipped back against the wall, his face in shadow. He was wearing a navy blue dress shirt that, in spite of its rumpled state, gave him the appearance of being well dressed, and a pair of navy khakis, new enough that the creases were still clearly visible. He looked like he might be a slumming -- he hadn't fallen far enough to fit in here yet. The table in front of him held an empty shot glass and an ashtray filled with cigarette butts.  
  
I felt a surge of hope -- or was the daiquiri making me nauseous? I changed course, putting as much sway into my hips as I could manage without falling out of my heels. I let my head fall down a little, so that my hair fell forward over my eyes, and peeked out at him from under my bangs with what I hoped was a seductive pout.  
  
I stood next to his table for a moment, waiting for him to look up and acknowledge my presence. He didn't.  
  
_Maybe he's so wasted that he hasn't noticed me yet._ I summoned my most confident smile and forced my voice into a sexy purr. "Hey, Tiger, wanna party?"  
  
Nothing. He didn't even move. _Had he fallen asleep with his eyes open, or was he pretending I wasn't there?_ I shifted from one foot to the other, waiting for a reaction -- or at least an indication that he wasn't dead -- but still he said nothing.  
  
I sighed. _Okay, back to plan A -- skip out the back._ But just as I was about to turn away, he asked in a deep, rich baritone. "How much?"  
  
_How much?_  
  
_HOW MUCH?_  
  
I stifled the indignant choking sound that I'd been about to make. _Be practical, Misao. You were planning to fuck him anyway, just for a place to sleep. What's the difference between that and getting paid?_  
  
_A big difference,_ a little voice in the back of my head said. For some reason that voice sounded a lot like Aoshi's, and it made me mad. Fuck Aoshi. Aoshi was the reason I was here now.  
  
"$50," I heard myself saying, as if I were standing somewhere else in the room, merely listening while one stranger offered to sell her body to another stranger. $50 would feed me for more than a week, especially if I was willing to sleep at a homeless shelter. I was.  
  
"Sit down," the man ordered. I sat down in the chair across from him. He leaned forward, but I had to squint through the haze of neon-lit smoke to make out his features. Sharp nose, heavy-lidded eyes, thin lips, high cheekbones. Not handsome, but striking. His expression was neutral, verging on bored. He seemed vaguely familiar, but the buzzing in my head, a side effect of drinking rum on an empty stomach, was making it hard to think. And besides, I was so embarrassed that I didn't really want to know. I didn't want to know anything about him at all.  
  
He gave me a once-over, and asked how old I was.  
  
"Twenty-one," I lied. I'd laid the makeup on so heavily that not only would he have a hard time guessing my true age -- nineteen -- he'd probably never even recognize me if he saw me without makeup. "Are you interested?"  
  
His expression didn't change -- he still looked bored -- but I had the distinct impression that he was suppressing a frown. "$50 for the whole night?" he asked in a skeptical tone that made me wonder if I should have asked for more. _Good job, Misao, not only are you now a whore, but you're an incompetent whore._  
  
I shrugged uncomfortably. "Whatever you want."  
  
"Give me your hand," he said, his voice softening a little. _Was that a yes,_ I wondered? Reluctantly I extended my left hand. He slid long, tapered fingers around my wrist, encircling it completely.  
  
"Close your eyes." _Now what?_ I closed my eyes, starting to feel nervous again. _What kind of weirdo did I just pick up?_  
  
_The kind of weirdo that takes home hookers he meets in bars,_ I answered myself. _I can't do this._  
  
I was about to jerk my hand away when the warmth of his fingers was suddenly replaced with cold metal. My eyes flew open. "What are you--?"  
  
Handcuffs. He stood up, pulled me brusquely to my feet, then clicked the second cuff over my free wrist. "You're under arrest."  
  
I stared at the floor while he recited my rights, hiding tears of mortification and relief behind the thick fringe of my hair. Who wouldn't be mortified? But relief? Absurdly, I felt grateful, as if the cop wasn't adding to my problems, but was somehow rescuing me from something much worse.  
  
And on the bright side, this did solve the problem of where I was going to sleep tonight. That's me, ever the optimist.  
  
"Let's go," the cop said, placing one hand on my shoulder and pushing me ahead of him. His car, an unmarked grey sedan, was parked several blocks away from the bar. He unlocked the back door, and opened it. "In."  
  
I hesitated. I'd never been in this kind of trouble before. Getting into the car would be stepping over a threshold that I knew I'd never walk back through.  
  
"Uh... I get a phone call, don't I?" I stalled.  
  
"Sure. Who do you want to call?"  
  
"Um..." The tears threatened to return, There was no one I could call. I didn't have any friends here in Houston. Aoshi was out of the question. And I couldn't think of anything that would hurt my grandfather more than learning that his little Misao had been been arrested for prostitution. I couldn't think of anyone I could call who wouldn't tell Jiya -- hell, who wouldn't tell everybody.  
  
At least this way, no one would know.  
  
_I might as well get in the car. It's not like things could possibly get any worse._  
  
I stepped forward to lower myself into the back seat, but I'd forgotten that my hands were cuffed in front of me and overbalanced. The cop caught me as I staggered against the door, and I half-turned in his arms, clutching at the front of his shirt as I struggled to regain my equilibrium. "Sorry," I breathed, my hair falling away from my face as I peered up at him. "I--"  
  
_Oh God._  
  
I tried to yank myself out of his grip, but his hands tightened around my elbows.  
  
"No, you don't--" His eyes widened in surprise as he recognized me in the orange glow of the sodium streetlamp, and he froze, as if he couldn't believe what he was seeing.  
  
Then it came, like I knew it would. The slow torquing of his lips into that infuriating smirk, the wicked light of amusement dancing in those golden-brown eyes, the arrogant upswing of one stern eyebrow. I flushed, and tried to pull free again, but this time he slid his arms around my waist, trapping me completely against the solidity of his body.  
  
_Now,_ I thought. _Now it can't possibly get worse._  
  
I performed a frantic mental inventory, but I had nothing useful at hand -- no gun, no sword, no dagger, no kunai, no shuriken, not even a nail file. When I'd wandered into the bar tonight, I hadn't realized that I was going to want to commit seppuku before the end of the evening. And there was no other way I was going to get out of this, unless I somehow managed to die from sheer humiliation.  
  
Hajime Saitou adjusted his grip on my waist and brought one hand up to lift my chin, forcing me to look him squarely in the eyes.  
  
"Why'd you cut your hair, Weasel?"  
  
_**--------  
  
Please, please, please review! :)**_


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